


Sonata

by Mitch



Series: Piano [3]
Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:20:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22561627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mitch/pseuds/Mitch
Summary: Prisoners in a madman’s palatial estate Jack suffers in his role as a chain keeping Daniel bound to the location. At the mercy of a psychopath who abducted and abused him long ago Daniel feels trapped in the musical world that used to be the pinnacle of his skills as a child prodigy. Jack knows it will take more skill than Daniel seems to possess at the moment to free the two of them.The collector revels at possessing his virtuoso once again. Oh, how the boy excelled under his guidance years ago and he will again. Keeping the American soldier as the boy’s motivation to obey is much more satisfying than the silver links were. Now his beautiful virtuoso can be encouraged, enticed to perform for him again. For him and him alone! The collector is most satisfied.
Relationships: Daniel Jackson/Jack O'Neill
Series: Piano [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1614163
Comments: 9
Kudos: 19





	Sonata

Chopin - Piano Sonata Number Three  
Beethoven - Moonlight Sonata Op 27

Far away under Cheyenne Mountain Sam Carter hurried into the briefing room. "Sir," she addressed General Hammond, "this message is from Daniel's grandfather. What do I tell him? He was expecting Daniel for a visit yesterday."

"I'd forgotten Doctor Jackson's request to visit through the gate." Hammond shook his head as he peered out through the observation window at the gate far below. "Tell him ... I don't think we should hide this from him. Ask him to come to Earth."

"Sir," Sam said with a hasty nod. She sent the message and was surprised at how fast Doctor Ballard dialed back, sending his personal GDO code through before appearing at the top of the ramp.

Sam hurried into the gate room and met the elderly man at the bottom of the ramp. "Doctor Ballard," she said respectfully, holding her hand out to him.

"Ah, the beautiful military scientist," Nicholas said as he took her hand between both of his. "Such charm and such intelligence."

"Sir," she said, ducking her head and giving him an embarrassed smile. "You're looking ... well. Remarkably well. Sir, if you don't mind me saying so you honestly do look...younger? I think ..." Sam pulled away and took several steps back. "SFs on alert! Med team to the gateroom!" she called out.

"Report!" Hammond demanded down through the intercom from the control room.

"Sir, he looks kind of younger!" she explained as she backed away.

"Ah," Nicholas shook his head. "I am not taken over by those Goa'uld, as you so fear, dear girl. No. Merely ... my time with the giant aliens, you see. I had hoped to show Daniel this new development before returning here and causing such alarm. Oh, that alarm!" he complained, holding his ears.

Sam stayed well back from the man as SFs kept rifles trained on him.

A medical team arrived, complete with portable fluoroscopes. Doctor Ballard was run through each test set up to detect a Goa'uld parasite. None was found, just as he'd claimed. When he was cleared and the medical team left, Sam stepped up to the man and extended her hand again.

"Sorry, sir. Though I didn't sense a Goa'uld presence in you, we take no chances here. You understand, we have to take precautions."

"Of course I do. Your precautions protect and ensure the safety of my grandson, don't they? To protect Daniel, I would endure anything."

Sam grimaced.

George came into the gateroom and greeted Doctor Ballard. "Sir, I'm afraid we have some difficult news. If you'll come this way?"

Three hours later Nicholas pushed past Sam and Teal'c and entered Daniel's house. He strode through the empty abode, taking in the sight and feel of his grandson's abandoned life. "Nothing. I see nothing out of the ordinary here."

"Yes sir," Sam said. "As I explained, our own team has been over it meticulously. We've found no clues here or at the colonel's. Actually we're sure they were taken from the colonel's house. Daniel's car is there and some of his ... clothes." 

She glanced back at Teal'c. They'd found a lot of Daniel's clothes and personal effects at the colonel's house. They'd also found two sets of clothing, his and O'Neill's, tangled together on the floor in the bedroom. The bed had been unmade. Rumors were not allowed to start as the forensic team was lectured harshly by the general moments after their first visit to the colonel's home.

Sam shook her head.

"And my grandson has not been heard of since. No communication from him or any would-be-captors?"

"None, sir. Him or Colonel O’Neill."

Nicholas studied the bookshelf, reading titles slowly.

Sam stared at him and started to speak but Teal'c laid a hand on her shoulder and quieted her. "Our elders must be given respect, Major Carter. Their actions need not be explained to us. Give him the time he needs."

"Yeah. He's probably just working it out in his head, finding a way to accept that Daniel's missing."

"As have you and I," Teal'c said with a bow of his head.

Nicholas touched one of Daniel's journals, running his finger down the spine. "All in perfect order."

Then he moved on to the kitchen. A bag of ground coffee sat tightly closed on the counter. A recipe, jotted in French was taped to the refrigerator door. The kitchen was spotless. He went to Daniel's bedroom. The bed was made. He checked his grandson's closet and then pulled out several drawers, searching through them. Some of the personal items there made him smile in embarrassment. 

Next, he went to the boy's library. Different objects littered his desk than the last time Nicholas was here. The boy was being productive. On the right hand corner of the desk he found a framed picture of Danny's Jack. The man was too old for his grandson. He was brash and shallow. Nicholas chided himself. Hadn't he said the same thing to his daughter about her fiancé? It had caused a distance to form between him and the girl. Then she'd married the American anyway. He replaced the photograph.

Then Nicholas steeled himself and finally let his eyes go to the grand in the center of the bay windows. The lid was closed. Odd. It had been open the last time he was here. Looking hard at it, Nicholas saw what he hadn't the last time. This piano had been purchased for the room. The size, a salon grand, with its rounded rim would produce the perfect timbre for such a small room. Daniel had bought it to play in this house. It had not been an idle purchase. 

So why was the lid closed? Rescued when he was only fourteen, the boy had refused to speak of the months of captivity. But Nicholas had read the Interpol reports, their findings on the condition of his grandson and his prison room. Nicholas had also read the statements of the older prisoners, those who were capable of communicating clearly.

Daniel could not have closed the lid of this salon grand Even if he'd expected to be gone quite some time. No. Daniel would not be able to endure the closed lid. Not even for a moment. Nicholas was sure of that. Though he didn’t want to face the truth, he had to! Daniel did not do this!

He heard a rustling at the door and saw Daniel's strange friends. He nodded to them, then went to the piano. The fallboard was closed, covering the black and white keys. A European instrument, this fallboard was of one piece, not two pieces like the Americans preferred. Nicholas raised it. Then he stepped back. What was he missing? What else was he not seeing that he should be?

He raised the lid, propping it carefully and then he stood in the doorway and matched the scene with what he had in his photographic memory.

"Sheet music," he said. "The last time I was here, there was sheet music on it. Why would Daniel have sheet music? Perhaps he was reading something new. He needs but one reading to commit a piece to memory. If so, where is it now?" Nicholas tapped his lower lip.

"Daniel plays?" Sam asked. "I guess he would, having a piano and all.

"No," Nicholas said. "He does not ... play. Virtuosos do not play. He performs. He used to. Not any more. What did I see on the piano on my last visit? It was hand written. Perhaps unfinished and yes, in his own hand. He was composing! So, where is it? Where is the music now?" Nicholas eyed the sturdy bench. It wasn’t one of those hollow things Americans liked to stuff full of their band music, the things they banged out on bandstands in their parks, the tunes they belted out while fireworks exploded overhead, crowing their independence like a barn yard rooster brags over his cackling hens. Nicholas scowled.

"Find it," he commanded the two. "Search with me. We must see if it exists or if it too has been taken."

Two hours later they'd leafed through every book, every drawer and combed through every cabinet and closet. No composition was found. There was a small stack of blank staff paper in Daniel's desk. Nicholas held the sheets up as proof, shaking them in his tight hand at the blonde woman and the small alien. "He was right. The monster still lives. My Daniel is in terrible danger. Summon your General Hammond. Wherever he is looking, it is the wrong place. I know who has my grandson. We must search for this man. He hides well. It will be a long search and any delay in finding this terrible man is deadly for my grandson."

~~~

Daniel huddled on the floor under the piano. Mister Black's men had thrown him there when their master commanded it so. He was cold, Daniel realized, and he could hear Jack's distant cursing next door. Black silk pants with a button waist band were dropped on the floor by the piano pedals. Then a shirt joined them. Daniel crawled forward and grabbed the material. Staying under the piano, he held the material against his chest and groin, eyeing the collectors black shoes. The museum guards had left. He was alone with the collector.

"A condom," Mister Black said. "I'm very disappointed to have had the lambskin between us. If you hadn't been carrying on with G. I. Joe in there we could have avoided that but I won't risk myself. Who knows what harlots he screws when you're not available. Have you thought about that? What diseases he has been exposing you to? My man found no condoms in your place. The tin soldier had a package. Unopened though. And no used wrappers have appeared since the surveillance began. Why not? Don't you care about your health?"

Daniel clamped his lips together and got the pajama shirt on. He pulled the pants on and buttoned the band closed. The shirt fit loosely but the pants were tightly tailored. The silk felt cold. The pajamas torn from him had been thin with strips of connecting threads running through the fabric making the ripping possible. Silk was strong. This set was strong but too tight in places that would make his silhouette obscene. The collector’s focus on his body was increasing. 

Daniel stayed where he was, numb inside and out. He watched the collector's shoes.

"Prepare yourself. Ready yourself to be bathed this evening. Your body will be cleansed and unwanted hair removed. I care for you now. You've needed me. You've needed the strong hand of a mentor. Someone to guide you and help you make the right choices in your life as I've done for other living works of art. I'll take over all of that now. You needn't worry ever again. Here, you'll have time to create. Time to sit and do the work God and I, the greatest curator of all time, intended for you."

Daniel clenched his arms over his knees and stared at the shoes. He'd hidden under the piano the last time the collector had him. Most days he'd been chained to it in an empty room much like this one but the chain was long enough to allow him to hide under the instrument of his torment. This time he was chained in a different way. And this time he hadn't scrambled under it, trying to hide. He reflected on how the monster's henchmen had thrown him under it even as he struggled with them. The collector wanted to see him cower.

"You may prepare yourself for your first performance a week from today. Nothing strenuous. In the meantime I have another coming acquisition to focus on. A dancer in Moldova of all the surprising places. He will join you soon in the exhibition hall, yes, as soon as my elite collection is large enough to warrant a showing. Moldova of all the surprising places."

Jack would be telling him to hide his strength, to plot, to give nothing away. This man wasn't going to be reasoned with. It didn't matter that Daniel was now an adult, capable of negotiating planetary wars to a peaceful end. This man wanted nothing out of his mouth.

"But next week, my beauty. Nothing strenuous, I assure you. I will be satisfied with whatever piece you choose for your comeback performance. Ah. It will be delightful! 

The shoes turned and Daniel watched as the man left him. Moments later Jack was thrown into the room, his white-clad body sliding along the black floor several feet. No henchmen followed him in. Daniel and Jack were alone again.

Jack groaned and Daniel crawled out to him, stopping an arms-length away. "You okay?" Daniel’s voice was flat.

Lying in a fetal position on his side, his eyes tightly shut, a harsh groan got past Jack's lips. Then he clenched his teeth. "Sh ... should be asking you that. He rape you?"

"Yeah," Daniel replied as simply as Jack had asked. "So you're okay then? You look like shit."

"Feel ... I'm okay. Didn't take me far." Jack stayed in the tight fetal position. “Maybe kinda far.”

"We'll get out of here."

"You ... sound sure now. Not like last time we talked."

"I ..." Daniel rocked back on his heels and clenched his arms around his knees again. "I'm clear about things. This ... " he paused and waved one hand at the place he'd just been raped, "this ... He shouldn't have done it. I remember it all now. No unknown to fear now. And I'm not fourteen. Not a child. I don't think he realizes that."

"Good," Jack said as he panted through the residue of pain. "That'll get us out of here. That's his fatal flaw."

A half a dozen of the goons entered the piano room carrying supplies consisting of a tub, buckets and toiletries. They began to set the stuff at the edge of the spotlight and leave. Only two remained. Before Jack could get to his feet he was addressed by name by one of the behemoths. But the most startling thing was that from behind the bulk of overly muscled goons two Japanese women came toting baskets of black towels and clothes. He was shocked at their clothing. It was as if they’d stepped out of some 1700’s painting of Geisha women. He realized it was the first time any women had appeared or that anyone other than the collector had spoken to him.

Instructions in heavily accented English were given by the goon. Jack could return to the white room next door while the pianist was groomed by the master’s ‘futari no jose’ or he could be shocked senseless, making the pianist’s impending ‘basu’ session begin in a more stressful way. Though the guy was clearly German Jack was sure he was using Japanese words. How many times had Daniel told him that context mattered most when listening to a foreign language? He knew the first part meant servants and the second part was ‘get a bath’ Jack sat up and twisted to see Daniel. Tight-lipped and just recently raped, Daniel sat hugging himself, his head down. 

“Daniel?” He got a nod but no further eye contact.

Jack rose and moved slowly toward the door. “Washing time at the zoo, hum?”

He got a better look at the supplies. The large tub was just big enough for a man to sit in, legs drawn up and the buckets steamed. He thought he saw a folded straight razor and an old fashioned cake of soap. There were other supplies but he didn’t get to see what they were. Probably other soap. Maybe shampoo. Old black-heart wanted Daniel clean and shaven. 

The two goons flanked him, hurrying him along by their looming presence and the presence of the fun buzzer toy strapped to the wrist of the slightly thinner one. In his white prison cell he was presented with an electric razor, a wet towel and a dry one. He took advantage of the supplies to get rid of the scratchy stuff around his neck and face. The wet towel helped get rid of the last of the pee residue he’d been living with for days, hoping there’d be no more occasions for the zoo keeper to add more.

Herr Asshole held off on the ‘piss-yourself’ motivation for a couple more days. Jack heard sporadic but short bits of Daniel playing. He didn’t think it was enough to satisfy the collector and he was right. The third night he was returned to the piano room and shocked so much he passed out listening to Daniel’s raging. It must have worked because he woke, piss soaked in the white room hearing constant piano music. 

It was dark again through the French doors when he was dropped in the music room again. Or maybe still dark, he wasn’t sure. But he was glad his eyes were able to focus on Daniel and his throat wasn’t too raw from screaming to talk to the archaeologist.

He did a bit of raging himself, just the two of them in the vast black chamber.

“Jack he said I had a week and I’ve only used up a little over half of that. Calm down. We have time to figure this out.”

“He’s gonna wait a week before he rapes you again?”

Huddled as close as he could safely get to Jack, he dipped his head and swallowed. “Maybe.”

“Okay,” Jack whispered. “Okay. Don’t mean to be adding to the problem. So what do we have, what do we need?”

“Out. Away.” He swallowed. “We have things. We have our clothes.”

“We have the piano, the wire, the bench, nail, a bit of aluminum. Couple of screws. Odd lighting. A slick floor.”

Daniel nodded and brought his head up. “The wire. His belief, the way he behaves as if I’m still fourteen. His attraction to me. The way he can’t resist touching me. His illogical thought patterns.”

“Yeah. Illogical thinking. We can use his blind spot about you. Thinks you haven’t grown up any since you got free of him.

“He couldn’t be more wrong. Did you list the idea of taking off one of the bench legs? I can balance on three.”

“That. Also just to shock you a bit I do know music. I can play the piano a little bit. Maybe we have that too.”

“You listen to opera music. You’ve got some classical CDs.” Daniel nodded. “We have that bit of your knowledge. And I forgot to add one thing we need. I told him I’d be the one to kill him. I need that.”

~~~

Nicholas paced through Jack O'Neill's home, bent on satisfying himself that no other clues remained. Daniel's clothes were here. That disturbed him greatly. The boy's clothes without their owner seemed to forebode terrible evil. That's how it had been in Europe so long ago. Snatched from his room at the conservatory in the middle of the night. There was nothing left but his clothes. Nicholas had flown to Italy and met his old friends at their lovely home. They'd been distraught. The boy he'd placed in their care back in New York was gone. Kidnappings were all too common in Italy in that era. One warring don with another. One political faction with another. And the slave trade. For those who prized beauty and youth, Nicholas knew the fair haired boy was a most tempting morsel. If it was a slave trader they would never find him. No one else would have reason to take him, so Nicholas thought.

Months passed and Nicholas had returned to his work. Then word had come. Interpol had taken an interest in the case. Daniel was not the only virtuoso to suddenly disappear in the past few years. Someone was collecting rare talents, strikingly handsome figures, geniuses of all ages. Daniel would be a must for such a kidnapper. His talent for music was framed by his genius for language, art, ancient history, so many subjects. 

Nicholas had no contacts in Interpol, but the boy's foster father did. With his contacts they flew to Salzburg and eventually traveled northeast into Linz by motorcar. The raid was staged at night. British-led Interpol forces coordinated with Austrian local authorities and special forces from Japan as well as the Soviet Union. Nicholas was forced to sit in the back of a transport vehicle kilometers from the estate in question. His one bit of solace was knowing that whichever armed force broke in to where his grandson was held, the boy would have no difficulty communicating who he was to them. They would know he was being held against his will and who he should be returned to.

And who would save him now? His Jack was a prisoner with him. Nicholas had to trust this General Hammond to do what had taken the combined forces of four nations to do before, and still those four nations had not managed to kill the monster. Would this time be any different? He hurried from the empty home. Daniel's friends waited by the curb for him. They were on a flight to Vienna by dark. 

Nicholas was determined to be there to help them find Daniel. Yes, Nicholas understood that monster, what drove him, what motivated him to seek and possess the finest things this world had to offer and the fate of others mattered not. He understood, had seen that dark mentality swirl up in history time and time again, culture upon culture.

In his childhood he’d seen firsthand raw thirst for power take hold of his world under the guise of national pride. It had swept up from the seat of madness in a monster's place of birth to overflow and almost drown the place of Nicholas' birth. He would stand against it again. And this time he would not leave Daniel in someone else's care to go in search of his giant aliens. Nicholas had the clarity now that he lacked when eight-year-old Daniel was in desperate need of him. Nicholas now was sane.

"The Rhine," Nicholas insisted to the gathering of Doctor Samantha Carter's people. They huddled in the middle of the dimly lit hangar, People he assumed were two foreign spies for America and a dozen leaders of soldier boys all around them. A topographical map of Austria was spread on the table they gathered around. Information was provided, filling his requests for land records, for sightings of certain types of vehicles, as well as any large, isolated estates that had air travel and water access. The information was filtered and refiltered by the team of those two secret spies at Samantha Carter’s command.

Odd, he thought, for this woman to be leading them all. But she loved his grandson, so Nicholas quieted his own gender biases and continued. "It is his home. He feels most safe in the Rhine. His ancestral lands are where he will have my Danny and his ... and your colonel. Understand, this man will have many in his employ. They will be well paid and have little fear of you and your forces, Doctor Carter."

"Sir, if you have some Austrian source for us to contact—"

"This is enough information and there is no more time. My Danny will not stay a live captive for long. In fact, we are ... We must move before another day dawns on this land. Here," he said commandingly as he ran his hand over the map, indicating the pinpointed estate among the ancestral lands of the man Daniel called the collector.

"If you could sir," Sam said, her voice clearly showing her effort at being tactful, "tell us the rest of it and my men and I will—"

"I have said there is not time. My grandson will not stay alive much longer. He will die and so will your colonel. If you people had contacted me the moment he disappeared—Time for recriminations later, miss. Come, now. I shall show you where you will station your forces."

Nicholas laid out a plan of attack. He'd studied the great battles of ancient Greece, the tactics of war of Alexander, of the brutal Norsemen whose lives began and ended with battle. Nicholas talked and the woman who loved his grandson listened, the small alien at her side nodding in agreement. This small alien was well versed in war tactics.

Sam Carter rolled up the map and issued a final command to the fourth black ops squad at her disposal. Navy seals and special forces together, these men and women, had been dropped less than thirty minutes ago and would be redeploying as soon as Sam got the word from General Hammond that their op had been cleared with local forces in the air and on the land. In deference to Nick’s plan, she would use her forces in concentric rings of penetration, depending on their security clearance.

This was a rescue operation that involved two top members of the most secret organization within the US military. No information regarding the SGC would leave their ultimate target and no person would penetrate the perimeter during the operation.

~~~

Kilometers away, Jack took several deep breaths and stretched his hands out over the keyboard. He could do this. He could. Dressed in Daniel's black pajamas, Jack licked his dry lips. Several feet, too many feet behind him Daniel, dressed in Jack's white scrubs stood with his back pressed against the dark wall, hidden by the stark shadow the piano's spotlight caused. 

Jack adjusted himself slightly right. The left end of the piano bench was missing a leg. He had to balance on the three legs and keep his head down, try to hide his silvery hair from the view of anyone approaching through the open doorway. The dark night out the French doors helped his subterfuge.

"Moonlight sonata," Jack whispered to himself. "And this is for you, old Missus Rosencrantz." He played the opening notes. "Old battle-axe," Jack muttered, his brow creased in concentration. He was sweating. The pain was a constant, low fire in his temples but they both knew Daniel couldn't be any closer. The collector would have no chance to compare them.

With his back plastered against the wall, Daniel held still. The collector strolled in through the doorway. No henchmen followed him. Just as Daniel had thought, the rape and the following sessions of rubbing himself against Daniel’s back as he played had sealed the man's confidence. He thought he'd won. And if Daniel were still fourteen, he would be correct. Timing was critical. He had to wait until the collector was away from the door but not close enough that he might touch Jack.

"Ah." Mister Black studied his prized acquisition. "Opus number twenty-seven," he said with a smile. "Silly boy, that's too common and you know it. I brought you something quite uncommon." As he walked he held up the precious sheets of hand written music.

Still as a statue, Daniel's breath froze in his lungs. His composition! For a moment he couldn't think. The song he'd been writing was in the sick bastard's hands. Daniel clenched his fist around the thin bench leg Jack had so painfully sharpened with a small bit of twisted metal he'd found by an outside door. No. No, he said to himself. This changes nothing. Watch and wait. Not too close to Jack.

Hunched over the keys, Jack squinted his eyes at the black and white rectangles. The next notes came to him as he needed them, but a burning sensation was beginning right between his shoulder blades. The collector was getting close. He could almost feel the man's light touch. He'd arch up off the bench, screaming in pain if the man touched him the way he touched Daniel. Jack blinked sweat from his eyes and played on.

"Disgusting," Mister Black said, showing amusement and much more tolerance than the playing deserved. "You practice common trash and do it as if you too are common trash. My dear virtuoso. Stop it. Stop, I say," he ordered forcefully. "You will play this for me or I will bring out the ropes."

Jack kept playing. He felt the spirit of Missus Rosencrantz snap her fingers, setting his tempo. Her battle-axe face was stern. When this piano lesson was over, she'd tell him again how his mother was wasting her money on him. Jack had wholeheartedly agreed back then. Now he was offering a prayer of thanks to his mother, to her love of classical music and her operatic talent that had kept him devoted to the piano lessons so long ago.

"Did you hear me? The ropes again. Did you know I have been recalling, counting the number of times I have been inside you, in your young body and adding in the time since you have returned to me? Recall our naked passion, sweetly peppered with your cries of love as I artfully wrested your virginity from—"

Barefoot and almost silently, Daniel rushed across the wide expanse. A yard from the collector he pulled the leg back and swung it like a club, the unsharpened end striking the man on his temple. The collector went down, having no chance to trigger the remote device embedded in his forearm.

Jack lurched away from his downed captor. The man was writhing on the floor. Jack pulled out the wire and tossed it to Daniel. Dropping beside the barely conscious man, Daniel wrapped a length of the stiff bass string around his neck. During the past few hours Jack had worked on the ends, forming two loops for leverage. Daniel held those to keep the wire taut but despite Jack’s work holding the wire around the collector’s neck was painful. He sustained a gouge in his palm but managed to ignore it.

Jack nodded. "Now we'll see how far we can get.” He rushed to the exterior doors but well before he arrived, the bars slid down, sealing them in.

Daniel jerked the loop mercilessly tight and hauled his prisoner to his feet. "Down," he said to Jack. "There'll be an underground passage out of here, just like in his last place. We have to find it."

"Basement has hidden doors in it. Operating room maybe. Remember that’s where I told you I woke up." Jack scooped up the piano leg, holding it point out and peered out into the hall. No one was present. "Deserted”.

Daniel eyed the scattered sheets of his composition. "Like I said, he doesn't allow an audience. I don't know what triggered the security. Maybe I knocked his arm around too hard." As his prisoner seemed to rouse, Daniel grabbed the collector’s hand, careful to avoid his wrist. He twisted the hand up behind his back and used it as a lever to march him along after Jack.

They went as quickly as possible, retracing Jack's desperate route when he'd first roused. No one appeared to stop them. "Where the hell are they all?"

"Release me and live," Mister Black snarled through his constricted throat.

In the lower level Jack ran along ahead of Daniel and his prisoner. He found the white room where he'd woken but kept going. The next room was an observation/control room. An oblong room, on the left it had a long wall mounted desk, angled to display rows of controls, mysterious switches and meters. Above the desk running almost the length of the room were a series of observation windows, almost exactly like the ones in SGC’s conference room looking down on the gate. These windows looked into a brightly lit operating room and above the windows was a bank of monitors. 

Two guards inside had apparently just come to their feet to peer at a monitor. It showed the white room Jack had just peered in. They whirled on him and Jack rushed them, swinging his weapon. He landed a glancing blow on the first one he reached and the man stumbled back against the control desk. The second came up behind Jack and he whirled, one hand under his opponent’s chin, his other hand behind his head. With a quick jerk he broke the guard’s neck.

Behind him the first guard gasped and dashed toward the only escape route. As the man stumbled out the hall door, he groped for the weapon in his holster but couldn’t get it free. He was armed with a Taser X-003, the same non-lethal weapon Jack had trained Daniel on only a month earlier. It had a slow recharge time between shots.

Daniel jerked back, dragging his prisoner to the right hand wall of the hallway. The guard focused on Daniel and his captive as Jack came charging. Instead of freeing his taser the guard lunged at Mister Black, snaking his hand between Daniel and the collector. He jerked the collector’s shirt up and pressed the man’s wrist to his back. Just outside the doorway Jack fell to the floor. Daniel pushed the collector to the ground and swiftly kicked the guard in the stomach. Then he wrenched the guard’s own weapon from his holster and fired the electric-pulse weapon point-blank into the man's chest.

The collector was squirming on the ground, getting the garroting wire off his neck. Daniel pointed the Taser at him but the trigger clicked uselessly. He lunged at the man and as their bodies met, the collector depressed his wrist trigger again. He kicked out at his virtuoso. Daniel lost his grip on the useless Taser.

Behind him, Daniel could hear Jack's heels and head beating against the floor by the control room’s open door. A second jolt so close to the first would have Jack debilitated for hours.

Daniel brought his knee down on the collector's throat, pushing hard. The man wrenched away, rolling to the wall and kicked back, landing a blow on Daniel's groin. Daniel rolled with the blow, passing through the doorway almost too close in his clumsy hop over Jack. He fell and landed with Jack’s sharpened piano leg under his back. Coming to his feet, Daniel grabbed their hard-fashioned weapon and whirled to face the collector. His next hop over Jack was coordinated and swift.

Mister Black braced himself against the wall and scrambled upright. His clothes and hair were in terrible disarray. He smoothed a palm over his hair and glowered at his possession. Then he smiled, his face a mask of evil. "I see my possession has learned something from the tin soldier." He smoothed one hand back over his hair again.

Daniel saw the man's eyes track to where Jack was still convulsing. 

The collector brought his wrist before his face and put his thumb close to the contact point. "Now you will learn more from him, learn how a soldier sounds when he dies. How long will it take, this constant signal?" He pressed hard.

Gripping the wooden weapon in both hands, Daniel charged full speed in the wide corridor. His bare feet had perfect traction on the waxed tiles. He lunged hard, driving the point in just below the collector's breastbone. The weapon sliced in, sinking through the lower esophagus. His blow veered right and pierced the lung as the improvised stake passed out of the body between two ribs and then lodged into the paneled wall behind the man. The collector was pinned like an exhibited bug in a natural science museum.

Mister Black's face blanched paper-white as he gaped at his pianist, his arms now limp.

Daniel stepped back and stared at the wide, blunt end of the weapon that protruded from his tormentor. The man gasped, shook his head and brought his hands up to scrabble at the stick. For a sick moment Daniel recalled Jack being pinned to the wall of the gateroom, a metallic rod piercing through his shoulder.

Then behind him he heard Jack's convulsive thumps slow down. Daniel glanced behind him. Jack was breathing and his eyes were open.

"Guhh!" Mister Black gasped out, his hands slipping around the now bloody stake.

Daniel whirled back to the nightmare that had haunted him years ago. Their gazes locked. The collector's eyes boded murderous desire. Daniel took another step back. 

Then the collector gave up on trying to wrench the stake from his body and jerked his head down and around looking at his wrist where the triggering device and transmitter were implanted. He smiled as pale, foaming blood began to drip from between his clenched teeth. Then he brought his other hand up.

Dropping into an assault stance, Daniel whirled around, bringing his heel up and kicked the man's other hand away.

The collector brought his piercing, bloody gaze up to Daniel again, his mouth now gaping open. Pale, foamy blood spilled down his chin and dripped onto the stake. He growled in anger but the sound ended in a wet gurgle. Again he brought his hand up to try to depress the trigger. Daniel kicked him again. Then he moved the wrist toward the stake, grinning madly.

Daniel knew what he'd do. He'd prop that arm against the stake so Daniel couldn’t kick it, then bring his other hand up to close the circuit of electricity that ran through a living body. He’d use the instrument that was killing him, use it to also kill Jack. 

Instantly Daniel leaped to the collector's side and grabbed the murderous hand. He held it by the palm, feeling the oily skin slide between his fingers. He grasped harder and squatted, scooping the discarded piano wire and Taser from the floor. Daniel tucked the Taser in the waistband of the pants he wore, Jack’s white surgical scrubs. He slid one loop Jack had made on one end of the wire over the handle of the Taser, quickly winding the excess wire around the bulky weapon. Then Daniel slipped the loop Jack had made in the other end of the wire over the imbedded stake. Quickly he passed the now taut wire around the man's elbow joint. He held the bulky, wire-wrapped Taser in his left hand. Then Daniel planted his left foot in the man's armpit and as their gazes locked again, Daniel kicked with all his might.

The wire snicked like a garrote, slicing through gristle and stringy muscle. He separated the arm at the elbow, pulling the joint apart allowing the wire to finish the job. The force of his kick sent him sprawling back on his ass. He held the detached arm carefully by the hand.

Mister Black gaped at the stump that now spurted arterial blood. Then he looked down at the living piece of artwork he'd collected. His eyes showed his unwillingness to believe what had just happened to him.

As Daniel met that shocked gaze he squared his jaw and clenched his mouth into a firm line. Then those dark, piercing eyes began to cloud over. The arterial spurts stopped and the pale foam ceased to drip. No new black blood formed around the stake’s entry point. The collector died.

Distant noises shocked Daniel back into action. He scrambled to his feet and threw the arm far into the control room. Then he jerked his shirt off over his head. Twirling it like a towel, he looped the middle of it over Jack's extended right hand and used it to drag the unresponsive man through the door and into the center of the control room. Quickly he slid the door closed, sliding its lower bolt into the floor and then the top bolt. There was no lock in the recessed handle but the bolts would do for now.

Obviously the guards’ purpose had been to stay sealed in here, controlling the security features of the compound should the collector need to escape again. They wouldn’t be controlling anything and the collector would never see freedom again.

Daniel leaned over the room’s long control desk and looked through the thick, angled glass of the observation window. There was the operating room where he and Jack had been cut into. No one had entered the operating room, though the door at the left end of the space stood open. 

His fists resting on the edge of the control desk, Daniel took a moment to survey the small space where he and Jack had taken shelter. There were security camera monitors along the wall above the windows, surprising Daniel. But they showed nothing more than the grounds outside, a dark tunnel exit and a helicopter pad. There were no views inside the house. No collected items were being filmed. On a few cameras showing swaths of lawn he saw guardsmen running toward the house. 

"Da— Oh," Jack groaned.

"Jack," Daniel said, whirling to find his team mate, eyes open, face slack. "You okay?"

"No. Thin’ I’s..." His words were incoherent, his voice weak.

"Think you were dying? Almost were. We've got a few minutes before they get through that door. If they do."

"Ih...?"

"He's dead. In the hall. I killed him. They'll probably leave when they see that. No one left to sign their paychecks."

"H’m...far?"

"Move him far from here? Won't matter.” He pointed at the severed limb lying far on the other side of Jack where it rested against the back wall of the small room.

Jack grimaced, unable to turn his head. "Wha?" His words were still slurred. “See.”

“Can you see his forearm?”

“Nun.”

“I cut it off with the wire. Disarticulated it at the elbow. Brought it in here with us. The door is bolted. We’re fine for a while. Just rest.”

“Piss— sed”

“Yeah, I was angry too.” Daniel sighed and leaned his head back against the door.

“Pin ‘Sef,” Jack corrected him, his words still so slurred he was surprised Daniel could understand even one of them.

Daniel slid down on the floor and watched the man he loved breathe. There were panicked shouts in the hall at his back. He heard arguing. Then he heard one clear voice issuing commands. Someone began arguing with that voice and then a shot rang out. The argument never continued. Then Daniel heard nothing. He waited a moment and then got up to peer at the monitors again. The operating room was still vacant. “Someone on his staff of guards had a handgun. Glad we didn’t run into that one.”

Jack remained motionless and Daniel fought the urge to go closer to him, to peer into his eyes. He also fought the urge to ask him if he was okay. He wasn’t but he would be. Matter of fact, that was the way they talked to each other. Daniel had been raped and Jack so matter-of-factly asked him to confirm it. And that was how Daniel answered him. He nodded. “You’re not okay, Jack. But you will be.”

“M’hm.” 

Daniel found water bottles in a metal cabinet. “Water when you feel up to it.” The dead guard had a taser on him and Daniel retrieved that. “No gun.” There was a seat cushion he slid across the floor to Jack. It went unheeded as the man could not move yet. “We can manage in here for a while. Just rest.”

“Say. You.”

Daniel pushed the dead guard to lie against the exit wall and then sat with his back against the door watching Jack breathe. “There are probably controls that turn off the bars, the thing inside your head. I just don’t feel like trying to poke around is a good idea right now. Later. If we have no other option. We can’t risk getting separated.”

“I’m die w’ouh you.”

Daniel laughed. “Sounds like a declaration of love. The overly obsessive kind.” He chuckled a little more. “I have to confess there are times I think I’ll die without you, Jack. I might be a little bit obsessed with you.”

“M’kay. Love.” He was proud he’d managed one word clearly and with some vigor behind it.

Daniel slouched lower against the door. “Maybe we’ll wait till dawn. Check out the controls. See if we can find a way to turn things off and call for help. But it needs to be the right kind of help. They have to understand they can’t separate us or cart me off in some squad car. I did kill someone. Can’t be local police.”

“George.”

“That would be nice. A contingent from the SGC storming in to save our asses.” 

Daniel didn’t sleep. He couldn’t help counting the passing time as he waited for Jack to recover the use of his limbs. Jack had banged his head against the floor numerous times and violently. He needed an ice pack. He needed a hospital and a team of doctors, not just ice. He needed brain surgery. 

He got up and pissed in a plastic drink cup that had been knocked off the control panel. He didn’t overfill it. His body had washed out the IV fluid finally. And he needed a world class shower, needed to wash off the stink of the collector. He needed a dozen world class showers.

As he sat the cup down he caught the activity on one of the screens.

"Invasion force," Daniel said. "Those are American uniforms. Jack? Americans. Oh, some have no patches. Maybe you’ll get your wild wish. SGC maybe. If so Nick must have gone to my house."

"Nick?" Jack asked, still flat on his back.

"Forgot I was supposed to be visiting him. Maybe he came to the SGC. If he found out I was missing maybe he went to my house. My composition. The collector collected that too. That must have tipped Nick off to who had us. I think I see Sam! There she is. Without Nick they’d never have found us this quickly. Nick. Jack, Nick's with her."

"Invas’n," Jack said.

"The last of the collector's forces are running, over here," he said as he pointed to another screen.

"Can't see ... screen," Jack said. "Not get up. We okay ‘n here?"

"Yeah. Sam ... There's Teal'c. They'll be in the house soon. They'll sweep the place. We'll wait until they come to us."

"Good. Don’t b’ drag my ass up th ... stairs an’ I ain't standing f’ few days."

Daniel smiled, but kept watching the monitors. Soon he couldn’t see any activity. Their rescuers were in the house above now. He waited quietly, ten feet from the man he couldn't touch.

"Never tol’ me ...’bout him."

"Never. How could I? This isn't something to share. Ever. Why the hell would I burden you with what I went through as a kid? Put it behind me. Let me see if I can find an intercom.” He managed to switch topics smoothly.

He examined the panels angled out before him. Nothing seemed to indicate such a device. “Nothing. But you said the collector talked to you through an intercom in the first room you woke in. None of these are labeled. Remarkable. Still, he was highly intelligent. Had a photographic memory but to trust his guards with remembering what controls to use seems a bit mad.”

“Mad. Crazy.”

Daniel let out a little angry laugh. “Yeah. Okay Sam’s with them. She’ll figure it out. Oh shit!” He lurched away from the panel and its windows into the operating room. Those were US Black Ops. He held up his hands at the guns that had been bought to bear on him. “Don’t shoot! Don’t break the glass! Get Major Carter! Get Major Carter!” Jack was making incoherent noises but he didn’t risk turning his back on the guns to check the man. On the slanted control panel desk he saw paper, pen and a black marker. He slowly got the marker and wrote backward on the window. One of the force held up his fist and then used his shoulder radio. Daniel waited, confident his message had been relayed to her. Guns were lowered along with Daniel’s frayed nerves.

Only moments passed before Sam was knocking on the hall door. Daniel went to it. “Sam?”

“Daniel? Open the door. There’s no lock outside. It must be inside.”

“Okay listen. You have to follow my instructions exactly or Jack or I could die. You hear me?”

“Go ahead.”

She sounded confident and for the first time in such a long time, Daniel turned back to look at Jack with a glimmer of confidence showing on his face.

Orders were dispersed to the contingent to avoid anything electric anywhere on the compound and to remove any remaining servants and themselves as swiftly as possible. Sam was the only one allowed in the lower floor of the expansive home of the collector. Still Daniel insisted on bolting the door behind her. Daniel slumped on the control room’s floor against the far wall by the collector’s arm and watched her study the panels of the guard’s desk. He drank water from one of the bottles labeled in Italian and managed to keep himself from creeping closer to Jack, still sprawled on his back in the center of the room, the cushion now under his abused head thanks to Sam.

“This is a mess, Daniel. I’ll send for medical supplies for the colonel. We’re going to be in here a while.”

“Can you get General Hammond to send a surgeon, a brain surgeon probably. Get them here on standby just in case the safest route is to try to remove it from Jack here in that operating room?”

“Mmm,” Tight lipped, she nodded and glanced up into the operating room. “We’ll need to sterilize it again. Our field medic can get started on that.”

“Just make sure while they’re searching the place that nobody touches anything electric. No light switches or anything. Like I said, there’s a transmitter somewhere in this building that will kill me if they turn off the wrong thing. I die and I think the next step is that transmitter will then kill Jack.”

“I need to step out for a bit. Make a report to the general and get Nick settled somewhere. Teal’c is keeping him under control.”

Daniel barked out a laugh that had no joy in it. “Would take him to accomplish that impossible task.”

She grinned at him. “The small alien.”

Daniel insisted he and Jack stay where they were until the right medical staff arrived. Sam got them both as comfortable as possible, Daniel with supplies for a bleeding gash in his side that she learned was actually a deep incision and the colonel with the softest thing that could be found. Teal’c found Jack a bed, a tidy rolled black futon and also ice packs. He fell asleep almost instantly, he’d been in such extreme pain his body was completely depleted. 

The entire time Teal’c was walking around in the control room Daniel’s nerves were on high alert. What might happen by accident? A trip, a fall that caused a connection between himself and Jack could be deadly. At least the Jaffa got the dead guard out. That helped some. Then he returned with a plastic bag for the collector’s arm. Daniel insisted on handling it, sealing the grisly item in with wide tape. He tucked it by his side.

Sam surveyed the room. “Okay that’s all we can do for now. You sure your grandfather can’t come down here?”

Daniel shook his head. He was exhausted but couldn’t trust anyone or get any rest since the control room door was open. “We’re going to Ramstein from here? Then home?”

“If the surgeons think they need to do something here, then when you two are ready for travel we’ll drive to Ramstein. The colonel won’t be able to fly for a while, I’m sure.”

Daniel nodded. “Bolt the door.”

“Can you tell me the details? What happened here? What happened to the two of you?” She had to tiptoe to reach the top bolt.

“No.” His voice was firm. “You know all you need to. The electronic leash system the collector set up. Just get Jack free.” Daniel laid down on the bare floor and closed his eyes. He had no intention of sleeping. A few minutes later it must have occurred to Sam to get him a blanket to rest on. It was OD green. He was thankful of the color and thankful when she bolted the door again.

His grandfather called him on Sam’s shoulder radio. He just shook his head at her and left it up to her to tell Nick whatever she wanted to. Daniel tuned out everything but Jack’s safety.

It was agreed on that Jack needed to have the surgery at the collector’s operating facilities. Sam had straightened out much of the boundary alerts, the alarms and transmitters but removing Daniel from the premises was still a risk. One could still be active. Daniel was still a prisoner and Jack was still leashed to him.

Jack woke under bright lights in a white room. He cursed. 

“Colonel?” 

It was Carter’s too-cheery face looming over him, not the collector’s zoo keeping goon squad. “What?” He knew he’d snarled and kind of regretted it almost instantly. “What?” He’d managed a better tone. “Where’s Daniel?”

“He’s here. We just wanted to be sure. I mean the surgeon is sure she got the device and the connectors out of you but...well are you okay? Can you move? You can’t lift your head. In fact you’re strapped to a backboard—“

“Where’s Daniel!”

“I’m here. Sam, could you step out? Give us some time?”

“Oh. The nurses too?” She blinked at the archaeologist and got a nod. His arms were crossed and he was standing by an instrument table that held the severed arm. He’d let go of it at least. That was good, she thought. His surgery was next but with a different kind of surgeon. She ushered the medical staff out of the room.

The observation room was still empty. He’d shut it and set Teal’c as guard. “But Sam? Stay out of the control room,” he ordered to her back.

Daniel approached Jack. “Still hard to come close to you. Damn,” he cursed softly, rolling the little table along with him until it touched the operating table. “Oh, hi.” He stared down. “They assured me it was out. I saw the screens during the surgery. It wasn’t deep in and they got it all. I could touch you.”

“Then why don’t you? Touch me.” Jack tried not to grin too broadly. He saw Daniel close his eyes and swallow. That dead bastard has used the word touch as a command. “It’s okay, Danny. Fuck that bastard and his words. We’ll use other words than that. Take my hand, please.”

Daniel swallowed and ignored the tears of anguish. He took Jack’s hand into a firm grip. “Did it. It’s okay. You feel any pain?”

“No, actually. I just had brain surgery? They cut my head open?”

Daniel swallowed and brought up his other hand, gripping both around Jack’s and bringing the man’s fingers to his chest. “Not brain surgery. Not exactly. She used the same entry the collector’s surgeon did. Back of the neck.”

“Oh fuck. A goa’uld scar? I’m gonna have a goa’uld scar?”

Daniel smirked at him. “Not exactly. She used surgical glue like they did before. A tiny mark. That’s all.”

“Used stitches on you instead of glue?”

“The surgeon thinks the collector planned to remove my device or go in and alter it. Maybe add something like a power pack to make me a more mobile prisoner. Sam set her up with a laptop and some documents. She has a few more to go through but I told her it’s over, doesn’t matter now. So I’m next on the table. Getting this taken out. It’s wrapped around my heart.”

“So the idea of me slicing in and slipping it out was pretty stupid, huh? One of your more stupider ideas.”

“Uh huh. So before they wheel you out and I get on this table I just wanted to...”

“Say you can’t live without me?”

“Say I’m slightly obsessed with you. In a good way.”

“In a loving way,” Jack whispered. “Me with you too. I already said the ell word in there on the floor. Covered in piss I might add. Can’t get any more romantic than that.”

Daniel ducked his head. “Probably not.”

Jack squeezed the hands that held his and then pressed his fingers to Daniel’s chest. “But we could try. I’m gonna try.”

“Me too. I ell word you too.”

End of Part Three

**Author's Note:**

> The final part of this story arc will be up within a week. I appreciate the comments!


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